Supercars more popular than ever in the UK

A survey carried out by the car buying comparison website, motorway.co.uk has revealed that supercars continue to rise in popularity in the UK.

Despite the fact that there has been a decline in the broader UK car market, the data shows that there are now 40% more supercars on our roads compared to five years ago. Ferraris and Lamborghinis have become particularly desirable with a 69% and 54% rise in sales respectively.

Motorway.co.uk analysed figures from the DVLA and reported that the number of people driving luxury vehicles many of which the prestige dealership H.R. Owen have, has risen by nearly 8% in the last year alone, taking the number of supercars on the UK’s roads up to 36,000.

While many doubted that electric supercars would ever take off, even these models have proved to be successful in recent years. The BMW i8, the world’s first petrol-electric hybrid supercar saw 1,747 new registrations in 2017 – a 14.6% increase compared to the year before and an impressive six times more (526%) than in 2014 when the vehicle was first released.

The top 10 supercars registered to drive on UK roads (as registered with the DVLA) between 2013 and 2017 include:

Aston Martin (DB7, DB9 and DB11). Increased from 6,256 registrations in 2013 to 6,734 in 2017

Audi R8 – up from 2,453 registrations to 3,341

The Bentley Continental and Flying Spur have seen a huge increase from 11,058 registrations to 19,963

When the BMW i8 was first released in 2014 there were just 279 registrations. By 2017 this had increased to 1,747

Ferrari (all models) – up from 4,174 to 6,077 registrations

The lesser-known Swedish hypercar maker, Koenigsegg had just one registration in 2013 and 8 in 2017

Lamborghini (all models). Increased from 796 registrations to 1,277

McLaren (all models) – 280 to 781 registrations

Mercedes (AMG G55, G63 and GT) has also enjoyed significant growth. In 2013 there were just 136 registrations for these vehicles. By 2017 this has increased to 1,148

Porsche (GT2 and GT3) – 811 registrations in 2013 to 1,319 in 2017

Speaking about the popularity of these luxury vehicles in the UK, director of motorway.co.uk, Alex Buttle commented:

“Recent figures have revealed that the UK is the supercar capital of the world when it comes to production, with the UK specialist car market set to almost double by 2020. While many of these cars head overseas, our research shows that lots are being bought by wealthy UK customers – so don’t be surprised to see more Bentleys, Aston Martins and Ferraris parked up on double yellows in years to come.”

According to SMMT, the country’s low volume, high value car manufacturing sector is the world’s largest and growing with combined annual production set to hit 52,000 vehicles within three years. Woking-based McLaren has also seen sales almost triple as it has ramped up production of its supercars over the last few years.

As Buttle confirmed:

“Brexit fears and toxin taxes don’t seem to have put the dampeners on the super-rich spending big on supercars.”